


Haunted House

by Angst_Distribution_Service (Mister_Fox)



Series: Fox's Horrorween Entries [1]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Gen, Ghosts, Happy Ending, Horror, Horrorween 2020, and examples of how not to tell your friends important things about yourself, brief mentions of injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:36:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27298765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mister_Fox/pseuds/Angst_Distribution_Service
Summary: Kisuke doesn't put stock in tales of curses and misfortunes. And especially not in stories of cursed and haunted houses, even when he is about to buy one.
Relationships: Shihouin Yoruichi & Tsukabishi Tessai & Urahara Kisuke, Tsukabishi Tessai/Urahara Kisuke
Series: Fox's Horrorween Entries [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1993159
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14





	Haunted House

Kisuke doesn’t spend a very long time wondering why the building he’s buying is so cheap.

He has checked for structural faults, unfortunate do-it-yourself amendments to it, looked into every physical detail he could think of and then some more. And there’s nothing suspect, not even a single bone in the foundation.

There is no clear or logical reason for the current owner to be so invested in passing the place on to someone _else_ for such a dirt-cheap price. In terms of illogical reasoning, however...

The owner says nothing, but the neighbours whisper stories about ghosts and misfortunes and bad luck. Which, well. Kisuke, and Tessai, and Yoruichi, are all, by some definition, already dead, and very ghostly.

If the soon-to-be-shop is going to be haunted by anyone, it is by them - because there’s no lingering souls around it, not even traces of a passing Hollow. The ghost stories about this place are quite literally just that.

And as for the stories about _curses,_ well _._

Kisuke doesn’t put any stock in things like that.

Murderous houses aren’t real and can’t hurt him.

But houses that are assumed to be murderous can get him a nice, cheap place to open up a shop and hide away the Hogyoku, which is finally one piece of luck in a long chain of ill-fortune that started with Aizen’s _experiments_.

Kisuke yawns, and looks at the house, illuminated by morning sunlight. Time to ward it so tight that nothing will ever find or enter this place if it isn’t wanted.

* * *

The building is comfortable enough, more than big enough for the three of them once a little _enhancement_ is done to it, Tessai drawing up the blueprints for space and necessary kido, and Kisuke doing the physical work of it _._

They try to fix the odd draughts in the house, the creaky, uneven flooring in some rooms, but can find no obvious flaws that produce the cold and twisted ankles - and, well. If there are ever intruders, there will be no way the house won’t catch them out and trip them up and send them sprawling face-down on the floor.

There is a small bird’s nest on the windowsill of Kisuke’s room, and he feeds the birds small handfuls of rice and grain, listening to their pretty songs in the mornings.

They’re very soft, cute birds. And seemingly also appetising, as Kisuke catches Yoruichi trying to stalk them one morning, planning to leap on the windowsill.

“Hunt some other birds,” he tells her as he picks her up in her cat form, and takes her down to the kitchen.

The reiatsu-powered lightbulbs in the room are dead again, and Kisuke sighs.

It is very irritating how they keep doing that.

* * *

Kisuke’s lab is gloomy and empty and silent without any assistants or fellow researchers in there. He misses the company, still.

But at least if he needs to test something, he now has a nice underground area a minute away to do it in, without needing to haul potentially explosive equipment half-way across the compound.

Win some, lose some.

Although the compound was admittedly much better lit, and much easier to navigate, compared to his current lab.

So perhaps it is win some, lose more.

* * *

“ _Fuck,”_ Kisuke curses, his face buried in his arm, trying to use the layers of cloth to filter the air he is breathing in.

He gives up on pressing the button that should have activated aggressive ventilation in the lab but hasn’t, despite repeatedly being present. Clearly, it’s not going to help if he keeps doing that.

Kisuke focuses his reiatsu in his nose and mouth and lungs to protect them from the toxic gas that was once a small pile of Chappy pills. He has no idea how the experiment went so side-ways, but what is done is done.

There are spare oxygen canisters, and he hauls one to stand near the workbenches. It’s a bit off with the air proportions, but it’s better than nothing, and better than the noxious, possibly fatal gas until he finds a way to fix all this.

He never had such problems in the Twelfth labs.

Perhaps he should be more careful, run more maintenance on everything? No, he needs to focus on the now.

Put together a mask, with a filter, to buy himself more time; then fix the ventilation system.

The line to the oxygen tank snaps without warning.

 _What a terrible day,_ he thinks, patching it up with tape.

* * *

“Ow,” Kisuke murmurs, as Tessai sets his leg, and applies healing kido to it.

Kisuke knows how to heal too, of course, but Tessai insists on best practice when possible - and healing oneself is not advised, as pain can be so distracting.

A single, unfortunate misstep on the stairs. And now he’s got a broken leg.

Well, at least it is not his spine or his neck or his skull, Kisuke thinks. This situation could be so much worse.

Perhaps he needs a little sleep, a few more balance exercises.

Tessai finishes, leaving Kisuke’s leg fixed, and vaguely aching.

“This house doesn’t like me,” Kisuke jokes. “Glitching lights, lab accidents, broken limbs.”

Tessai snorts in laughter, his face a picture of gentle amusement and fondness, his hand warm and comforting on Kisuke’s thigh.

“It _does_ seem to hate you personally. Yoruichi-san and I have zero such problems.”

“The building has favourites? How cruel,” Kisuke says, dramatically pouting, half-covering his face with the fan. “What’s next, an official divorce?”

He keeps smiling, but, well, if only it _were_ all as simple as the house being pissed off. Absent-mindedness and distractibility will get him in worse trouble soon since he seems incapable of learning to pay attention to things, and thus stop getting injured.

“Would you like me to carry you back to bed?”

“Thank you, Tessai-san. Although I would enjoy that more if, perhaps, I was to not be alone in it.” Kisuke winks and gets a snort in reply.

Tessai’s opinion of Kisuke’s genuine flirting skill is very low.

Not that it seems to make it any less _effective._

* * *

Something moves at the edge of his vision, and Kisuke twitches his head just enough that he should be able to see it without giving away that he noticed it.

But there’s nothing.

Just dark shadows, and floorboards that creak under his feet.

Nothing.

* * *

The falling shelf and beakers on it - all of which had been very much secured, he’d _triple_ checked everything just a week ago - nearly takes out his left eye with the glass shards that rain through the room.

Right.

Enough is enough.

Yoruichi is a prankster, but she would never set something so potentially dangerous.

Tessai prefers word jokes and terrible puns to amuse himself.

Perhaps, however unlikely it is, there is a saboteur inside this wretched place.

* * *

“Still looking for your mystery ghost?” Yoruichi laughs at her own joke, sprawled on the living room couch watching something on the television.

Kisuke shoots her an unamused look as he taps his way across all the walls, just in case one of them harbours an empty space or some such.

True, his searches so far have repealed no sign of some invader, a person or soul or camera fly, that could be deliberately sabotaging him.

But he can’t be _so_ clumsy as to be continually getting in accidents.

And cursed houses are _not a thing._

* * *

The kidou, the harmless experimental construction that should _not be able to to do this_ , blows up in his face.

Kisuke barely has the time to raise his arms to shield his face as the light burns through his reiatsu like it isn’t there. Idly, he realises why - it’s only half-formed, not genuinely separate from him yet. So he is unusually vulnerable, even more than if it had been merely reflected at him.

Before he loses consciousness, he has the passing hope that Tessai isn’t going to get too annoyed by another crater in the training grounds when he finds him — or having to heal him again.

Well, Kisuke will make it up to him. He always does.

* * *

Kisuke wakes up in bed, yawning, and stretching.

There’s no pain.

A moment later, he realises why that is odd. He was just in an explosion. Or, at least, the last time he was awake.

Fortunately, it seems like Tessai or Yoruichi had found him quite quickly, and done an excellent job of patching him up again.

It would be best for all of them to avoid that particular explosion site for a while - unstable reiatsu doubtlessly lingers there.

And maybe Kisuke should spend more time sleeping, taking a break, if he is messing up such simple kido.

* * *

Something is wrong with the gigai, he can’t get in them no matter how much he tries, but he is far too tired to figure out what went wrong.

Tessai is more than happy to man the counter, anyway, as long as Kisuke helps out a bit with the cleaning and candy-making to replenish the stocks.

* * *

“Aren’t you out of your favourite tea yet?” Yoruichi asks idly, face hidden behind a newspaper as she sits in the kitchen, waiting for her takeaway ramen to cool. “You haven’t left the house for your usual weekly restocking trip for the last while?”

Kisuke blinks. He checks the cupboard.

The tea is out, yes, and now that he is looking at it, he remembers finding the empty container several times over the last weeks. Somehow, the thought of going outside just keeps slipping his mind, as he drifts in and out of his room, taking a break from potentially dangerous accidents.

And it’s working - he hasn’t so much as fallen over once.

“When was the last time you’ve even left this place?” Yoruichi continues. “You look awfully pale. You should get some sun.”

Kisuke can’t remember.

Which is odd. He used to go out regularly enough, for a quick patrol or shopping or to get some takeaway. Tessai’s tried to drag him outside a few times, but somehow Kisuke just… ended up back in his room, every time. He smiles vaguely at Yoruichi, tucking away his concern deep inside his heart.

“I’ll go outside today. Just busy with resting. I suppose I was just tired this past couple of days.”

“Couple of days? Kisuke, we’ve barely seen you for three _weeks_.” Yoruichi sounds- concerned, for a moment. “Well, I guess all the accidents got you down. Oh! Make sure you clean up the training area after you get your walk. I think something died there, maybe? Weird smell of some kind, at the very least. I’d tell Tessai to check it out, but, uh. He’s even less fond of bad smells than I am.”

And as a cat, with a very acute sense of smell - yes, Kisuke is the best choice to check out foul odours.

* * *

Kisuke isn’t sure why standing on the porch is so nerve-wracking. He’s just going out for a little bit. It’s fine. Everything is _fine._

Why is he rooted to the spot? Why can’t he just _step forward?_

Minutes of trying to move later, he spins around.

Yoruichi said there was something odd in the basement.

He should check that out.

He will. Deal with whatever mental block he has acquired _later_.

* * *

There’s a body lying in a crater. It’s strange, a mix of _decomposing_ and _fading_ _away_. Not exactly how a gigai or a dead soul should behave. But even with the peculiar decomposition, there’s no way Kisuke could fail to recognise who it is.

Grey-blond hair splayed like a halo, burnt and ash-streaked. Old-fashioned green clothes, dark and sooty and crumbling where the flames from the strange explosion had licked them.

His gigai, he thinks for a moment, and then realises-

He hadn’t been wearing one during the experiment. He was just himself.

That is his _own body_ there.

Which means-

He’s _dead_.

Somehow- he’s dead. But he’s also still _here,_ just fine-

Except. Except he can’t wear a gigai and he can’t remember the last time he _ate,_ which should be every day, except he doesn’t remember eating for _weeks,_ and _he can’t leave the house_ , so maybe fine isn’t a good word here.

He’s a ghost—a different kind of ghost, somehow, which shouldn’t be something that can happen. But he’s dead and still here, so it must, somehow, be possible.

The accidents have stopped now that they managed to- now that he is dead (Extra dead? Dead twice over? This will need new terminology, he is sure). And if he died from them, that implies they were _meant_ to kill him. And they all happened in the house. And now that he is dead and _trapped_ inside the house. Put all of that together, and there’s only one conclusion he can draw. The building must be cursed.

Kisuke kneels next to himself and stares at his own face.

He should… would burning it damage him, actually?

Maybe.

Cold storage combined with stasis kidou for the corpse, then. Maybe he should clean it up too? He might need it to be presentable.

Then he can figure out what he feels about this.

Or maybe not. Maybe he can postpone _that_ part forever.

* * *

“Yoruichi-san, Tessai-san, I have something to confess to you.” Kisuke takes a deep breath, avoiding looking at them, and instead looks down at the lab table, covered by a large sheet.

He’s called them down here, but- it’s hard to explain.

“I’m dead.”

Yoruichi opens her mouth to say something, her expression extremely confused - weren’t they all dead to start with anyway, after all? - and Kisuke pulls the sheet off the table, exposing his corpse lying upon it, and activating the motion-triggered confetti and glitter bombs.

For a moment, his two friends are silent.

“Of all the ways, you could have done this, and you _decided to do it like this?_ AND YOU’RE ALSO DEAD?”

Well. At least now she knows?

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Halloween! Comments and kudos welcome.
> 
> Some notes:  
> The house is, in fact, deeply cursed, but hones in on Kisuke as the target and leaves everyone else aone bc he's the only official owner. It kills him and keeps him.  
> As a differnt kind of ghost, Kisuke is now incapable of leaving the property outside of a few special cirumstances, his ability to affect the world with his powers - which are there, just somewhat diminished - is limited to the building, he doesn't need to really eat or sleep or drink like shinigami do.  
> And also he spends a lot of time hibernating - it takes energy to walk around and do things, so he's actually asleep pretty often. How active he is depends on the time of year, which frightens Yoru and Tessai because they think Kisuke's fading - until the realise the pattern, anyway.


End file.
